


keep on turning out and burning out

by endofadream



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Amputee Bucky Barnes, Bartender Bucky, Blowjobs, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Steve is running away from his problems
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 12:31:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10967286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/endofadream/pseuds/endofadream
Summary: “Rough day?”Steve looks up, peering through his fingers. He hadn't noticed the bartender when he came in, but he’s noticing him now. Specifically, the bright blue of his eyes, the strong lines of his jaw and cheekbones, and his ridiculous resemblance to the classic Hollywood bad guys. That, and the pinned-up shirtsleeve on his left side.





	keep on turning out and burning out

**Author's Note:**

> i started this fic over a year ago after going to one of many seedy, run-down bars in and near my southern illinois town. there's nothing like cheap chairs, cheap beer, cheap food, and the wealth of oddities that come to get them. also, i totally just wanted to give bucky a midwestern accent.

This is the kind of place where everything looks sticky, like you wouldn't want to touch even the doorknobs. Dim lights, wood paneling, flickering neon signs like faded eighties music videos advertising Coors Light. In the corner the battered old jukebox croons “Sweet Dreams” by Patsy Cline; her doleful, staticky voice seems right at home amidst mismatched chairs and half-empty ketchup containers.

There’s nobody in here, surprising for this time of night—six, prime time for the nine-to-fivers and men working construction and city jobs to be sidling in, world-weary with crumpled fives and tens in sweaty palms and a day’s worth of troubles ready to be backwash at the bottom of pint glasses. Considering, though, the amount of winding backroad that Steve had to drive to get here, the loneliness of the place maybe isn't so surprising after all.

He drops off at the bar, sitting heavily on a stool. It creaks, groaning protest under his weight, vinyl squealing against the denim of his jeans. He scrubs his hands over his eyes and rests his elbows on the bar top. Sticky; no surprise there, at least. He accidentally knocks the small wooden bowl of bar nuts and they rattle.

“Rough day?”

Steve looks up, peering through his fingers. He hadn't noticed the bartender when he came in, but he’s noticing him _now_. Specifically, the bright blue of his eyes, the strong lines of his jaw and cheekbones, and his ridiculous resemblance to the classic Hollywood bad guys. That, and the pinned-up shirtsleeve on his left side.

Dog-tired from his drive, Steve doesn't even realize that his gaze is lingering until the bartender smiles, putting down his rag, and says, “You ever hear the joke about the one-armed bartender?”

It snaps Steve out of his daze, and he scrabbles up off the sticky bar top as quickly as he can. Through the rush of mortification Steve appreciates the man’s slight drawl, how the consonants crawl slow out of his mouth like molasses. Thing about Midwestern accents is that, most of the time, they aren't accents at all. Down here, where the south creeps up and bleeds into the farming culture, they take on a certain drawling twang. The bartender's voice has a roughness to it, much like the gravel Steve's tires crunched over on the way here; it's the pleasing kind, the kind that Steve knows sounds extra good when pitched low and murmuring filthy things in your ear. Christ. He shouldn't be thinking things like that.

“Aw—god,” he says, “I’m so sorry—”

The man waves his words away, quick with a lazy flick of his wrist. “I’m just giving you a hard time. You get used to the stares after awhile, when you don’t let them hurt you no more.”

The stares Steve knows: growing up small and scrawny until late in high school had provided plenty of them and a wealth of rejected advances, and he could have let them turn him bitter like sour milk, but instead he’d shaken them off. He doesn’t say any of this, though. Doesn’t really think it’s necessary. Inside, he’s thinking that this man’s hair—nearing shoulder-length, brown—looks good tucked behind his ears. Blames it on the drive, the weariness grabbing at his bones, and says, “Shot of JD. Please.”

The bartender hums, flinging his rag over his shoulder before reaching behind him for a bottle, then under the counter for a glass. “So it was a rough day.” In the grimy mirror behind him Steve can see his reflection and even agrees that he looks like hell. He’s been wearing the same shirt for two days and he hasn’t shaved in about five. It’s a long way off from the clean-cut Steve Rogers from Brooklyn, that’s for sure.

“The worst.” The drink is slid over to him and Steve knocks it back quick, wincing at the burn down his throat. “More like the roughest week, actually.” He sets the glass back down on the counter. “Hit me.”

He gets a brow raise in response. “Bad breakup? Argument with the wife? Got yourself in a bit of money trouble?”

Steve bristles easily, suddenly, irritation a sharp thorn lodged in the heel of his foot that he can’t quite get at. “You don’t even know me.” He’s been quicker to anger than normal these days, which is certainly saying something, given that his knuckles bear their fair share of brown-pink scars from fistfights in the school parking lot. That’s how the world works, though: squeezes you tight until you either let yourself flatten or fight back. Early on Steve learned that it was better to fight back, even when it was guaranteed that you would lose.

The bartender doesn't respond to the terseness of Steve’s words, shrugging instead. “Don’t need to know you to see that you got a lot of troubles sitting on your shoulders.”

The shot is poured and Steve knocks it back, too, hisses through his teeth and lets the warmth of the alcohol settle slow and lazy in his belly like a cat stretching out in the sun. He shakes his head and gasps, thunking the glass back down onto the bar.

The bartender is still watching him, eyes slitted a bit like he’s trying to figure Steve out in some way. The thought makes Steve prickle even more and he scrubs his fingers over his mouth and finds himself saying, “Why do you care?”

In return he gets another shrug. The damp rag over the bartender’s shoulder gets used to scrub at the counter, and Steve absently takes the time to appreciate the man’s profile: the softness of his stubble-dark chin that somehow doesn’t seem out of place with the hard lines of his cheeks and jaw; the vaguely-European prominence of his brow; the soot sweep of his lashes and the supple bow of his mouth.

It’s quick that Steve’s mind wanders to how that profile would look on the thick pages of his sketchbook, how the orange-yellow light behind the bar casts shadows in just the right amount of places for his pencil to move easily and do his work for him.

“It’s not that I do or I don’t care,” the bartender is saying while Steve is picturing just the right way to smudge the charcoal in the hollow of his neck. “It’s that two shots in a row ain’t usually taken by men who ain’t runnin’ from something.”

Steve knows he has a point. He’s never been much of a drinker, recreational or otherwise, never truly saw the point in drowning his sorrows in booze. Now, though, he sees the appeal of it, especially in a place like this, where sorrow is practically a last name. And bartenders are something akin to priests, aren’t they? A childhood of attending confession has made Steve familiar with the process of letting it all out.

“It’s…a lot of stuff,” Steve says slowly.

The bartender takes away the shot glass and fixes Steve with a calculating stare. With his piercing blue-gray eyes, it almost sets Steve to shuddering. “Any of it stuff worth talking about?”

Lifting one shoulder in a shrug, Steve takes a handful of bar nuts. They taste a little stale, but then again he isn't eating them for pleasure. “You aren't a therapist.”

The bartender snorts and rubs his nose with the back of his hand. “Buddy, I practically got a PhD in helping people sort out their woes. Comes with the job.” The door to the bar opens and a man walks in. Suit rumpled, black hair graying at the temples, tie slightly askew. Steve watches him take a seat at a small table in the corner of the joint. The bartender lowers his voice, leaning in. “The man that just walked in? Talked him out of jumping off the bridge when he lost his business.”

Steve looks back, eyes wide, and the bartender gives a half-smile and a nod, straightening back up. “You hear a lot of stuff just pouring drinks. Once people get a little of the juice in their system everybody becomes their therapist. And I like helping people.” He reaches under and grabs a glass this time, fills it to the top with foaming amber beer before sliding it across to Steve. “So if you wanna talk I’m your guy.”

Steve fidgets, running the suddenly-clammy palms of his hands over his jeans. What could he possibly have to lose? He’s in the backwoods of the Midwest with his life over a thousand miles behind him. When he closes his eyes all he can see is wavy brown hair and red lips, and Steve is either being slowly eaten alive or driven crazy. At least here his story will become just another sob story soaked into the worn wooden paneling. Just another ring left on the counter by a drink long since gone. His ma always said that letting it out is better than keeping it in.

He reaches for the glass and says, “I don’t even know your name.”

Those shapely lips twitch up, just a fraction.

“Bucky,” the bartender says. “It’s Bucky.”

Steve nods and takes a drink. It’s a little too hoppy for his taste, but it gets the job done just the same. Bucky busies himself serving the other man and cleaning the bar, refilling the bowls spaced throughout. It isn't until Steve is halfway through his beer that he finally says, “You were right.” He has to clear his throat as it gets tight. Presses his fingertips to the inside corners of his eyes and squeezes them shut tight. “About it being a bad breakup, I mean.”

Bucky’s eyes flash to him, then back down, quick, and he draws his lower lip into his mouth and nods. It’s distracting; Steve blames the hum of alcohol that has finally begun to get pleasant, and the fact that Bucky is entirely too good-looking to be working in a dump like this in a town barely on the map.

“Lady or fella?”

The statement jarringly cuts through his thoughts. Steve looks up in surprise. “Um…it was a girl, but how did you…?”

Bucky rolls his eyes. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you keep staring at me. Subtle you are not…” He trails off, looking at Steve expectantly.

“Steve,” Steve finishes. Isn’t sure why he gives his name, either. Maybe it’s because Bucky had. He takes another sip. “I’m, uh, sorry. If I keep staring. I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Bucky barks out a laugh and smiles a grin so wide it scrunches his eyes at the corners. “Uncomfortable? Nah. You’re the most attractive man I’ve seen walk through the doors of this establishment in a long time. Usually the stares are reserved for Nat.”

Steve nods like he knows who Nat is, plays it cool by taking a sip of beer and hoping that his face isn’t flushed too red. The truth is that his heart is fluttering at the compliment and the fact that, slick with saliva in the gritty light of the bar, Bucky’s lips look _really_ kissable.

He clears his throat and stares down at the chipped bar top. Heat is pooling in his gut and he blames it on the long drives, the one-star motels with crappy porn and broken-down beds. The craving, cigarette-strong, for intimacy. His vivid imagination, which is now playing a fuzzy picture of Bucky on his lap in one of those crappy motel beds, back arched and sheets twisted around his legs. Face a picture of the purest form of pleasure and so goddamn beautiful Steve could cry.

“She dumped me,” Steve says, and he hates the waver in his voice. “Kinda stupid, getting all choked up about it at my age. But we were together for a long time, and…”

“Yeah.” Bucky nods. “Shit like that ain’t easy to get over.”

Shit like that is what drives a man to get in his car and drive with no real destination and no real desire to do anything other than feel the rumble of the highway under the tires and watch state line melt into state line. Shit like that is what made him quit his latest freelance project and grab a handful of maps of Midwestern America. His phone has been off since Pennsylvania and Steve finds himself not missing it so much. In a world so interconnected through media, it’s nice to dump all that and disappear.

“Yeah,” says Steve. “Shit ain’t easy.”

Silence falls again, but it isn’t weighted or awkward. Steve drinks his beer, Bucky bustles around the bar.

“You don't sound like you’re from around here,” Bucky says eventually.

The man in the rumpled suit stands from his chair and makes his way over to the jukebox. Coins jingle in his pocket as he scans the selection, and it’s only a few minutes before Styx is filling the small bar.

Steve shakes his head. “I’m not. I’m from Brooklyn, actually.”

Bucky lets out a soft noise, eyes widening a little. “Shit, no way. I grew up there, long time ago. Through a very long and ridiculous series of circumstances I found myself here.”

He doesn't elaborate. Steve doesn't ask him to.

“We aren't too different, are we?” Steve breathes a laugh, shaking his head.

“Little broken but perfectly functional,” replies Bucky, giving a grin to where his left arm should be. “Most of the time, anyway.”

Most of the time. Steve lets out a heavy breath, shoulders sagging. He’s been fighting this drag since he drove past the New York state line; it catching up to him has been inevitable, so he shouldn’t be surprised. Still, it doesn't deaden the way that the sorrow sneaks up on him, grabs his heart in a cold fist and squeezes. God, he fucking hates when the melancholy reappears.

He finishes off his beer in one long, final pull and sets it down on its faded coaster. Steve watches the foam slide down the inside of the glass for a moment, the bottles on the wall behind it blurred and distorted. He sees something of himself in it, taps his fingers on the counter and says, “You ever decide that you just…I don't know, want to run? And get away from everything.”

Bucky nods. “All the time, pal.” He takes the glass, making to grab another, but Steve waves it off. He hasn’t been eating much in the last few days and the alcohol has caught up to him quickly, giving the room a slightly off-kilter feel, his limbs already feeling slightly heavy.

It’s also what loosens his tongue further, has him looking Bucky in the eye. “That’s what I did. After…everything. Just got in my car and drove. I’ve always wanted to drive cross-country.”

“And you figured now would be the perfect time?”

“Better late than never, right?” says Steve.

Bucky’s lips quirk. “You could say that.”

They fall silent, staring at each other, until Steve shakes his head and says, “Another shot of JD.” At the very least he can get drunker and try not to lean over the bar and kiss Bucky. Or maybe it’ll make that outcome more likely. At this point, Steve doesn’t really find a problem with that.

He takes the shot with vigor, lets the warmth burn down his throat, spread into his chest. He thinks of the asthma he suffered from as a kid when he imagines the alcohol reaching his lungs. He fiddles with the shot glass, running the pads of his fingers over it, feeling the chip on the rim and the heavy weight of the bottom. He slides it back over to Bucky and takes another handful of stale bar peanuts.

“It’s not worth it,” says Bucky suddenly. Steve chews. Swallows.

“What’s not worth it?”

“Running away. Tryin’ to escape the ghosts, the could-have-beens and the maybe-if-I-hads. They just eat you up inside, Steve. No matter how far you go they eat you up ’til you ain’t nothin’ but bones that even the hungriest vulture wouldn’t touch. Running away is coward’s work, and you ain’t no coward, least as far as I can tell.”

Steve begins to get a little hot under the collar, and not in a good way. More like the back-alley way, the heat he gets just before he settles his stance for a fight. He straightens and narrows his eyes, all camaraderie gone. “I appreciate that, but you don’t know me.”

Bucky doesn't back down, narrowing his eyes as well. It makes him look dangerous, unpredictable. But it also makes him look a little bit sad. There are things lurking behind his eyes, dark shadows in the deep of the ocean. “I don’t have to know you to tell you that all running away does is make everything worse.”

Bucky’s got him there, much as Steve hates to admit it. He has no family but he does have friends that he left hanging who are probably incredibly worried about him. But Steve is always itching for a fight, especially lately, and he doesn't want Bucky to win this one.

“I only told you a part of what happened,” Steve argues.

“Still means that there’s more lurking underneath, like an iceberg.”

Steve stares, annoyed with Bucky’s nonchalance as he putters around behind the bar. If he knows pain, too, then why isn't it slowly corroding him the way it is Steve? He touches his chest sometimes, just to make sure that the pain there isn’t the gaping hole he feels. Sometimes he can’t breathe from it. Sometimes he prays for it to swallow him whole. Pain is shifting, growing, without edges or borders.

“What’s in it for you?” asks Steve. He gestures uselessly. “Helping me, I mean. Listening to my sob story bullshit.”

“I like helping people, I told you,” Bucky replies.

Steve shakes his head. “No, don’t give me that. People are always caught up in their own crap, no matter how much they pretend to listen. We’re all just waiting our turn to speak.”

“I ran,” says Bucky, quick and simple and without preamble. He rubs absentmindedly at his chin and doesn't meet Steve’s eyes. “I ran from New York, same as you.” He gestures to his left shoulder, says, “Lost this arm in a car accident ‘bout twelve years ago. Lost my whole family, too. Mother, father, two little sisters that I loved more’n I loved anything else in the world. And after that the city just lost its magic to me. Was nothin’ but gray concrete and emptiness. So I got out. Landed here.” He shrugs. “Never looked back. But you know what? I still ache, same as I did in Brooklyn. Still have the nightmares, still dream that I’m trapped in steel and lookin’ at the red-covered bodies of my family. All I’m sayin’ is you can’t escape pain, Steve, ‘cause it’s inside you. It follows you everywhere, same as your shadow. You just gotta learn to live with it and move on. ’S all any of us can do in this life.”

He finally moves his eyes to Steve’s, gives him a little half-smile. The man that Bucky saved from jumping off a bridge has changed the jukebox again; now it’s America. “Don’t Cross the River.” Oddly fitting. Buck says, “Still think I’m just waitin’ my turn to speak?” with a little insecure twist of his lips.

“Shit,” Steve says ineloquently. “Shit.”

It draws a more real smile from Bucky, has him laughing quietly under his breath. “Yeah, I get that reaction. It’s why I don’t tell anyone.”

“I’m sorry.” Steve runs his hand through his hair. “Christ, Buck, I’ve been such a tool. I shouldnta acted like that. I don’t have a right. I don’t have any damn right to act like I’ve been through more than you have.”

“Steve.” Bucky rolls his eyes. “It’s okay. It was a long time ago. It’s a wound that’s gonna fester but it’s somethin’ I gotta live with.” He sets his hand on the counter and stares levelly at Steve. “No one’s sadness is worse than others.”

“Yeah, but it doesn't mean that’s okay. No one should have to suffer like that.”

Bucky scoffs, but it isn't condescending. Fond, more like, as he looks at Steve with something like exasperation on his face. “Pal, you gotta live in some other dimension, ‘cause we got a lotta shit we gotta suffer through in life. Kinda the deal of being human.”

And he’s right. Steve knows that. He’s suffered plenty in his own life, so maybe that’s why he’s so sensitive towards other people’s plights. He couldn't save his relationship, couldn't save himself from his own thoughts from time to time. He’s got the scars for that. Is this why people become philanthropists? Or is it just some predestination to be good towards others?

His fingers twist over each other, dogs chasing their tails. The story he wants to tell is stuck in his throat, like it’s grown claws and is latching on, unwilling to be told. It isn’t something he tells a lot of people; he doesn’t want their sympathy. He’s had enough of that for a lifetime.

He looks up. Bucky is so goddamn beautiful, a diamond in a mountain of coal. Through the weariness he still shines so bright. Before now Steve had never truly believed that you could latch on to a person as fast as he has in the last few hours. Maybe that’s why he feels compelled to speak.

“My ma died when I was eighteen,” he begins. Stares at the countertop, feels his heart beating hummingbird wings in his chest. “My dad was already out of the picture. Died when I was a kid, real young. Desert Storm. I didn’t—I had no family. They’d come here from Ireland before I was born and I didn't know any of my family back there. And we were…we were so poor. I couldn’t keep the apartment, not after funeral costs. And I’d had a job, this shitty gig as a dishwasher, But I stopped coming in. Couldn’t do much else other than grieve. I, um. I lived on the streets for a bit. Drew pictures, got some money from tourists. After I turned nineteen I met my friend Sam when he was volunteering at a soup kitchen and he basically forced me to take this part-time job at a local cafe. I guess what I’m sayin’ is…I know what it’s like to stew. And I know that it can seem easier to dwell on shit and let it hold you back but it’s not. It just makes everything worse.”

“I’m real sorry to hear that.” Bucky sounds sincerely sympathetic.

Steve waves him off like he’s used to when people hear, and Bucky says, “No, I mean it. Life can be a motherfucker. I guess it says something that fellas like you and me are still here, huh?”

“Yeah,” drawls Steve, “that they were right and hell is on earth.”

Bucky laughs. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. S’why you gotta get your own little slice of heaven.”

“Is that this place for you?”

Rolling his eyes, Bucky rests his elbow on the counter. “My little slice of heaven certainly ain’t this place.” Close, Steve can see the faint lines around Bucky’s eyes and around his mouth. The weary look about him. In the space of a second Bucky’s eyes dart down, then back up. Steve wonders if he’s imagining it or not.

Behind them the song changes again. The Traveling Wilburys, Steve guesses. His ma was always the one who knew more about the classics. Bucky is still staring at him. It blossoms heat on Steve’s cheeks. It’s been—too long, he knows. Far too long since he's let himself be looked at by someone else.

Clearing his throat, Steve takes the leap, says, “Yeah?”

Before Bucky can answer the door opens. He looks up, behind Steve, and says, “Aw, shit, here comes Nat.”

Nat, as it turns out, is a beautiful redhead with curves to die for and a red-lipped smirk that shows she knows how good she looks. She walks with a slinking, easy grace, and Steve is enraptured the moment she leans over the bar. It has less to do with the creamy swell of her tits in her low-cut tank top and more to do with the fact that she’s at ease in her own skin in ways that Steve probably never will be.

She sets Steve in her hooded gaze. “Has James been taking good care of you?”

He looks at her, nonplussed, a little mystified by her voice that’s as smoky as the best bottle of whiskey behind the bar. “James—?” he manages to get out.

“Bucky,” Nat says. “His real name is James. He insists on going by that ridiculous nickname of his.”

“It is not ridiculous!”

“You’ve had it since you were six,” Nat replies, twisting to give him a withering look.

Bucky shrugs helplessly in return. “There were a lot of Jameses in my class.”

"Wait," Steve cuts in, "how many?"

"Five, not including him," Nat responds. "And I know you're waiting to ask, so yes, James and I went to school together. So if you think you're going to fuck him over I'd suggest thinking it through a little more clearly. I like knives and I'm good with my fingers."

Steve's eyes widen.

“Anyway,” says Nat, turning back around like she didn't just threaten bodily harm, “I’m hoping that _James_ here has treated you to some real hospitality.” And Steve thinks it may be the alcohol, but Nat’s words have edged into suggestive, turning into a near purr at the end. He feels his skin heat and ducks his head, not quite able to meet either of them in the eye. Nat snorts. “Thought so. Now get the hell out; it’s time to start my shift.”

Bucky tosses the towel down on the bar top, saying, “Fine, kick us out. I see how it is.” He turns to look at Steve. “You comin’?”

Steve blinks, not quite sure what to say. He’d planned on just stopping in here for a drink or two before finding a seedy motel to crash at, maybe surf for some subpar porn, but there’s something glinting in Bucky’s eyes that tugs at Steve’s gut in just the right way and tells him that he might want to consider a rain check on that subpar porn. Suddenly he finds himself nodding and standing.

Bucky leads them out the back door, the one marked _employees only_ in cracked, fading letters, and before Steve can protest Bucky is kissing him, hungry and deep, and Steve is helpless to do nothing but open his mouth and moan at the slick slide of Bucky’s tongue. Fucking hell but it feels good. Bucky kisses the way Steve does and Peggy never did: rough, but with sweet, slow swipes of tongue in between.

Bucky pulls back abruptly, leaving Steve leaning forward, whining a little, bottom lip still stuck out. When he opens his eyes Bucky is looking unsure of himself for the first time all evening, hand running through his hair and eyes not able to stay on Steve’s for longer than a few seconds. “You did…you are okay with this, ain’t ya? You don’t gotta be out here with me, if you wanna go I’m not stoppin’ ya—”

Steve grabs Bucky by the front of his shirt, fisting his fingers in soft cotton as he tugs him forward and slots their lips together, eyes fluttering shut as he licks his way back into Bucky’s mouth and groans. “Shut up,” he breathes, dick already fattening against his thigh, mind swimming in the thick sludge of lust, “and fuckin’ _kiss me_.”

“So fuckin’ hot,” Bucky is murmuring, carding his fingers through Steve’s hair, down the curve of his shoulder, over his waist. Touching like he’s mapping, memorizing. “God, Steve, you don’t even _know_ —”

Steve knows because he’s been thinking the same about Bucky all night. Then Bucky is kissing him again and Steve is grabbing a handful of Bucky’s hair and taking control of the kiss, angling Bucky’s head and brushing their noses together before nipping at Bucky’s lower lip. Bucky fumbles for the back door, pushing it open and shoving Steve outside.

“This is reckless,” Steve breathes, allowing himself to be pushed against the rough wooden slats of the back of the bar. The night air is cool where it nips against his skin; by contrast Bucky’s lips are searing hot as they slide up his neck. “Anyone could— _oh_.”

“Trust me,” Bucky breathes, just a little smug, and the teasing flick of his tongue against Steve’s ear has Steve’s knees weakening. “Ain’t no one comin’ out here. ‘Cept us, hopefully.”

Steve can’t help but laugh. Rough with arousal, Bucky’s voice grows thicker and slower, and Steve’s dick takes interest quickly. Bucky presses a kiss to the hinge of Steve’s jaw and then he’s sliding down, hand following the hard lines of Steve’s torso, until he’s settled on his knees.

“You’re okay with this, right?” Bucky asks again, looking up, fingers on the metal of Steve’s belt.

It takes an embarrassing amount of time for words to even come to Steve’s brain, much less make it past his lips, at how dark Bucky’s eyes are already; he lets out a little whine, head tipping back, and groans, “God, you have _no idea_ how okay I am with this.”

Bucky’s hand slips lower, pressing over the bulge of Steve’s cock, and he’s smug as Steve gasps. “Think I do, pal.”

Then he’s undoing Steve’s belt, nimble and quick for just one hand, tugging the zipper down and the flaps of his jeans open. For a second there’s a pause, like Bucky’s sizing him up; then there’s the hot-damp circle of Bucky’s mouth over Steve’s briefs, tongue a damp pressure as he teases, sucks, until the cotton is soaked and Steve’s knees are trembling.

“You’re such a tease,” he croaks, shutting his eyes and letting his head fall back against the siding.

“You think I’m a tease now,” Bucky drawls vibrating against Steve’s skin, “just wait ’til I get you spread out on a proper bed. Ain’t no part of you that I ain’t gonna touch.”

Steve opens his eyes and tilts his head down, has to squeeze them shut again because he’s afraid he’ll come just at the sight of Bucky on his knees, mussed hair falling over his forehead. He points his tongue and drags it up to the thick waistband of Steve’s underwear.

When Bucky sees that Steve is looking he pointedly brings his hand down to his lap, rubbing himself through his jeans and panting against Steve’s hip. Steve can’t help his whine, cards a hand through his hair as his head thunks against the wall again. “Fuck,” he breathes, incapable of saying anything else.

“You’re tellin’ me.”

Bucky’s hand is back at Steve’s hip, impatiently tugging down jeans and underwear until they’re bunched just under Steve’s ass. Through the pounding of his heart and the rush of blood in his ears Steve can just barely hear Bucky’s reverent, “Well, look at _you_ ,” before his hand is splayed on Steve’s ass and his lips are around the head of Steve’s cock.

“Oh, Jesus, _Bucky_ ,” Steve gasps.

He takes a handful of Bucky’s long hair, gathering it up and off to the side as Bucky sinks further down. At the first tug the vibrations of Bucky’s moan rattle Steve to his core; he does it again, harder this time, dragging Bucky’s head back. It has Bucky pulling off with an obscene noise, saliva stretched from his lip to the head of Steve’s cock. His nails bite into the meat of Steve’s ass.

“Christ,” says Bucky roughly, a roguish, indecent smirk curving his lips, “who knew you were so rough?”

Steve flushes.

“It’s okay,” adds Bucky, holding Steve’s cock as steady as he holds their eye contact, “I like it rough.”

Steve is dead. He’s pretty sure he’s dead and that heaven is an old bar in the middle of nowhere, because Bucky must be a goddamn angel with the way that he sucks cock: it’s the kind of hungry, desperate enthusiasm Steve had thought you only ever saw in porn. Eventually Bucky’s eyes slip closed, a little furrow appearing between his brows as he sinks lower, lower, pulls back to hollow his cheeks and tongue at the slit, breathing harsh and heavy through his nose.

“Hell,” Steve breathes, cupping Bucky’s jaw, smoothing his thumb over his cheek to feel the slide of his own cock as Bucky bobs his head, squeezes Steve’s ass and teases his crack with the tips of his fingers. Steve shivers. “Goddamn,” he says, “you look good like this, Buck. Real fuckin’ pretty.”

Bucky moans, forehead creasing, the suction of his mouth getting wetter, the sounds slicker and filthier as saliva begins to drip down his chin. Jesus. Steve’s had messy blowjobs before, and has given some himself, but Bucky’s a whole new level of it. His hand goes to his lap again, fumbling with his zipper and button until they pop open and he draws his dick out, shuddering as he wraps a hand around himself. It just might be the prettiest sight that Steve’s ever seen, Bucky’s mouth stuffed full of cock, his hand wrapped around his own, head leaking wet in the circle of his fist.

“Yeah,” Steve murmurs, running his fingers through Bucky’s hair. His filter is pretty much the first thing to go when he’s getting his dick sucked, but it seems like it just might work for Bucky, so he doesn't stop: “Touch yourself, that’s it. Christ, I can’t get over the fuckin’ picture you make right now. So gorgeous with my dick in your mouth. It gets you that bad, don’t it, sucking cock? Just gotta touch yourself.”

Bucky whines and sucks harder. It’s answer enough, Steve thinks, and he trembles a little. Bucky pulls off with a wet noise, takes Steve’s balls in his hand and ducks his head to suck them into his mouth in turn. He licks back up Steve’s cock, tongues at the leaking slit as he looks up at him. He still cradles Steve’s balls, rolling them gently in his palm while he hums, says, “They’re so heavy, doll. How long’s it been, huh? How much come you got for me tonight?”

Steve invents several new swear words in the span of fifteen seconds.

Bucky laughs. “Been that long?”

Steve’s actually drawing a blank trying to come up with an answer. So, yeah. “ _Months_.”

“Oh, you poor thing,” Bucky coos. He stretches up to lick the sensitive spot just under the head of Steve’s cock, lets it rest on his tongue before sinking down then sliding off. He says, “Just let me take care of you, doll. Make you feel so good,” as he wraps his hand around the girth and begins jerking Steve off in slow, tight pulls that leave Steve’s toes curling in his shoes.

It doesn’t last near as long as Steve wants it to. Not with the way that Bucky looks, the way that his own cock is curved up between his legs between the open flaps of his jeans. And it’s a nice one, average length but thick enough that saliva builds in Steve’s mouth just thinking about getting it down his throat.

Bucky catches him staring and smirks, tongue licking at the corner of his mouth. “You want it, don’t you?” he asks, letting go to wrap his hand around it, giving it a tight stroke up to the head. As Steve watches a bead of pre-come pearls up, drools down the slit and to the tight ring of Bucky’s fingers. He whimpers. Bucky’s grin grows wider, turns sharp and knowing. “Yeah, you want it, huh, Stevie.”

The nickname makes Steve’s knees weak; he sags against the wall, tipping the crown of his head against it as he squeezes the base of his dick. This is like the most erotic, intense game of tennis the way they’re lobbing words at each other. Like one trying to break the other first.

“M’gonna come,” Steve gasps.

Bucky surges up, sucks Steve down to the base with a muffled gag, eyes squeezed shut and forehead creased, and that’s all it takes. He’s twining that long brown hair in his fingers, thighs trembling as he arches. The orgasm feels like it’s been pulled from deep within him, intense and world-shaking as Bucky swallows him down with muted gulps, hand stripping his own cock.

Steve is still shaking when Bucky pulls back with a wet gasp, come stringing from his parted lips into the open cavern of his mouth, and spills over his own hand. He presses his forehead to Steve’s hip while he, too, trembles.

“Oh shit,” Steve mutters. Everything feels like static. Absently he plays with Bucky’s hair. “Oh shit.”

The laugh from below is weak, the words nearly incomprehensible. “You’re fuckin’ tellin’ _me_.”

“If I’da—” Steve sucks in a great breath, heart still pounding away in his chest. “Jesus, if I’da known telling my fucking sob story would get me laid I woulda said it a million times over.”

Bucky sits back on his heels, then staggers up. Steve’s eyes fall to Bucky’s hand, wet with his come. Contemplates tasting it, sucking those long fingers into his mouth one by one. But he’s exhausted and kind of drunk, and maybe if he asks nicely Bucky will come back to his hotel and they can do it again. “Way to make a guy feel special,” Bucky ribs, eyes crinkled up.

Steve takes his face in his hands and kisses him, groaning low in his throat at the taste of himself on Bucky’s tongue. It’s either the alcohol, or the orgasm, or the thrill of his first sexual encounter with someone he’d just met, but Steve says, “You’re so beautiful, Bucky.” He strokes over Bucky’s cheekbones and says, “Come back to my hotel with me?”

Several seconds pass before Bucky says, “No.”

Steve pulls back, blinking rapidly and suddenly feeling very foolish. His hands fall to his sides, stiff. Of course. Of course Bucky would only want a quickie. After all, Steve is only the lonely man drinking at the bar. He was so stupid to think that _anything_ could come of this, especially given how gorgeous and impossibly out of his league that Bucky is. He could have anyone.

Steve backs off, hurriedly tucking himself back in and zipping himself up. His fingers tremble on the buckle of his belt and he tips his chin down to focus intently on it, like it’s an important task that must be finished.

The touch of fingertips under his chin startle him; Steve gets only a glimpse of Bucky’s winter-blue eyes before he’s being kissed and Bucky is saying, between sucking on Steve’s lower lip and biting it until it’s throbbing, “No, you idiot. You’re not going back to that shithole. You’re comin’ to my place and then you’re gonna be _comin’ at my place_.”

Steve laughs, loud in the silence of the deserted back roads, and kisses Bucky back.

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr is [here](https://endofadream.tumblr.com) and instagram is [here](https://instagram.com/wintersoldiered), if you’re into that sort of thing! reviews are awesome, i love them, i love you.


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